Bike Tour Day 7: Germany, Meiningen - Ansbach

Arrived at the final destination save and sound. The last day was quite good to ride, although the legs were tired and they were happy to hear that it’s the last day. Other than for those guys, who ride the Tour de France. If I’m not mistaken, they go beyond 3000km in those 14 days, which means pretty much double the distance than this Nordic - Central European tour. No wonder they sometimes need some special powders in their drinks. My breakfast this morning wasn’t too bad either. A multi vitamin tab dissolved in water, a magnesium food complement, an aspirin (the short nights, let me wake up with a slight headache) and the rest of the previous day’s Power Bar. With this dope it was hop on to the bike to get to a place with real breakfast.

42km later, the little place Bad Königshofen appeared on the route (see the SportsTracker map) about 10km behind the border of Thuringia and Bavaria. Two bakery/coffee shops open on a Sunday morning, awesome! Of course, 2x Laugenstange (= a kind of Pretzel), cake and hot chocolate is what you call a real Sunday breakfast and beat the earlier in take by far. This tasty energy made the following 100km through the northern Bavarian wine region a piece of cake. Well, the weather got better again and admittedly the knowledge to arrive at the final destination later that day made riding easier as well, it’s been kind of enough (kilometers) for this time again. The wine region is known for it’s dry white wines in those round shaped bottles calle “Boxbeutel”.  The landscape was ok to ride. It constantly goes up and down but there are no huge elevations. The roads go nicely around the vinyards which are mostly on the southside of the hills. The villages in Bavaria are 2-3 km apart from each other and to the great majority lie in the valley between two higher points. This means, you come downhill and reach the entry of the village with quite a speed. Then, there’s almost always a couple of sharp bends or traffic structures that make you slow down quite a bit. When all your speed is gone, it’s time to climb out of the village again… grrrr.

36km to Ansbach said the sign at the end of a small village. This felt like being on the home straight. The B13, a major road felt like a constant slight down hill stretch, except of the 2km climb with partially 7-8% steep uphill patches. The villages left and right became all too familiar from my times in high school. A last re-fill of gas (=Dr. Pepper) at the petrol station 5km prior to Ansbach and then with quite some momentum past the town sign at the entrance to Ansbach. A nice small town it is (see the video above). Another 5km to the suburbian villages on the other side of the place. Mum and Dad and sister were already waiting in front of the house (they saw my progress on Sports Trackers Live Share) and a strawberry cake was waiting on the ready made coffee table. 195km were over for the day, 1599km altogether, quite a tour!

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Tags: bike tour